Home sales bounced back in October, hitting a milestone that hasn't been seen in years.

Sales of existing homes rose 3.4% in October from September, the National Association of Realtors said Thursday. At the seasonally adjusted pace of sales in October, 3.96 million would be sold over the course of the year, 2.9% more than in October 2023. It was the first time since July 2021 that the year-over-year pace of sales accelerated.

The sales uptick was a rare bright spot in a housing market that's been nearly paralyzed by a combination of high prices and high mortgage rates. Unaffordable mortgage payments have driven first-time buyers out of the market and slowed sales to a crawl. For-sale inventories have increased in recent months as more homeowners are putting their homes on the market, a proposition that often means giving up a low fixed-rate mortgage for a new one at a considerably higher rate.

"Finally, good news in the housing market," Lawrence Yun, chief economist at the association, said on a conference call with reporters. "More inventory is clearly helping boost home sales despite this elevated mortgage rate condition."

There were 1.37 million homes for sale in Oct🎃ober, up significantly from the end of last year. However, that's still well un𝓀der typical pre-pandemic levels, and the pace of sales has remained slow by historical standards.

Mortgage Rates Could Be The Key

Whether the market makes further progress back to the old normal could dependꦰ on how mortgage rates move in the coming ༒months.

According to Freddie Mac, the average rate offered for a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage was 6.78% last week, up from 6.08% at the end of S🃏eptember.

Rates have moved up in recent months despite the Federal Reserve cutting its influential interest rate. Treasury investors have priced in the potential impact of 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Donald Trump's re-election and the possibility that some of his proposed policies would stoke inflation. That has, in turn, pushed mortgage rates, which are heavily influenced by the 10-year treasury yields in particular.

Policymakers at the Fed 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:anticipate cutting interest rates more in the coming months, as long as inflation stays on🌞 a downward trajectory. Yun said that could pu🍬t downward pressure on mortgage rates but likely not enough to bring them back down to pre-pandemic levels.

"Maybe the mortgage rate will go back down towards 6%, but I think that's about it," he said. "We are not going to return to a 3%, 4%, 5% mortgage rate condition."